Ready to kick your educational video content up to the next level?  Or maybe you have an amazing student project that incorporates video production?  Did you know that UMPI has an innovative Media Production Studio (MPS) on the bottom floor of South, which houses a great recording space, complete with lighting, microphones, cameras, a green screen, and even access to an Editing studio complex with Adobe Premiere Pro!

Tips | Preparing to Record | Video Management Tools | Lending Library | Adobe Creative Suite

How can the MPS meet your needs?

Having the Media Production Studio on campus is such an amazing asset to help faculty, staff, and students create higher quality, engaging video content. Demand for video, and specifically, high-quality video continues to increase every year, and the MPS equipment is an accessible, portable way to capture and edit media for a wide variety of purposes.

With your instructional materials

Gone are the days of videotaped chalkboard lectures, badly lit, riddled with bad audio, and long monotones. Tech-enhanced education at every level is adopting new, increasingly active techniques. Video plays an essential roll in interactive-learning and in flipped classrooms. Students are more engaged when a video is used, and retain more of what they are taught when video design is thoughtfully designed to reduce extraneous cognitive load.

Students have also come to expect high production values, and this can be a challenge for the educators making the videos, and the MPS gives us the tools to start creating higher quality course intros, lecture segments, lessons, and demonstrations.

With your project-based learning assignments

The MPS was conceived with student project-based learning in mind! Creating assignments or assessments with a video component can be rewarding and engaging for students or small groups–and can also provide students with additional career-ready skill sets. Be sure if you would like to incorporate video projects, though, that you give students lots of extra time to practice and get to know the equipment. If you would like more tips of guidance on how to set students up for a successful semester with the MPS, please give the Center for Teaching and Learning a call!

Video Recording Tips

  1. Make time to script and storyboard–to save time on production and editing
  2. When creating your timeline for creating your video, be sure to incorporate time to practice and learn the tools
  3. Test the lighting and sound settings before you start shooting
  4. If you are using a MPS SD card, please remember to save your video and project files to your Google Drive project file before leaving the studio.
  5. If you are utilizing a green screen, remember: don’t wear green!

Prepare Before You Record

Depending on the purpose of the video you’re creating (whether a short 1-2 minute introduction, a longer 5-7 minute instructional video or an even longer documentary or interview), you should over- plan in your script-phase, with the knowledge that you will need to trim it down as you go. Regardless of production length, though, you should plan for 125 to 150 words of dialogue per minute.

As you begin, focus on saying everything you want to say, you can even use a voice-to-text program to capture your thoughts if that process works well for you.  Once you’ve got all of your dialogue down, check your word count–does it align with your desired video time?  Is there any repetition that was not by design that can be cut? This method makes your script clear and concise. It forces you to keep only the dialogue you need.

Let’s look at some easy-to-apply tips to get you started:

  1. Speak to your audience. Use “you” and “your” language. After all, who likes to be talked at, right? 
  2. Be conversational. Your script should read as if your audience is sitting down with you while you walk them through your topic, not like they are reading a trade journal
  3. Nothing beats a read aloud. The easiest way to determine if your dialog sounds natural (and to practice your tone, pacing, etc) is to read your script aloud–to yourself, or your neighbor or your dog.

Once you go through these three steps, you’ll have a really great handle on how long your video is going to be AND how much footage you need to shoot and what shots you need (if you are doing a voice-over). As a bonus–your script can play double duty as a tool to help you storyboard the visual pieces of your video!

Stay on script with the Teleprompter

Utilizing a teleprompter allows you to stay on script, without the awkward missed lines, memorization, or looking at notecards. The recording space in the MPS has a teleprompter–with an iPad/app to help capture those times that we need to instruct, show, explain or storyteller, in a way that is natural and produced-looking! Here is a peek at our teleprompter:

Here are some other helpful tips and accessories that will take your teleprompter use to the next level:

  • Hint: Make sure you charge up the iPad before you start filming!
  • The Elite Remote allows you to control the iPad app with the touch of a button, to slow down, speed up of pause the teleprompter
  • The iPad come loaded with the Teleprompt+ app, you can easily upload already created files and scripts into the app.

Storyboards are a way for you to decide how you will split up your script into individual segments, either with or without placeholder images, so that you can then get a clearer overview of your digital story plan. Creating storyboards may seem like an unnecessary and time-consuming extra step, however, it is a time-saving step in the creative process. It allows you to visualize how the project will be put together and help illustrate any holes that may exist before you start filming. Storyboarding also inspires new ideas lets you easily rearrange potential segments before the final development begins (again: see time-saving).  Storyboards can also be created digitally, with a pencil and paper, or using post-its (perfect it you like to switch segments around).

Here are some things your storyboard can include:

  • Boxes are read left-to-right.
  • In each box draw the basic composition of the scene.  Art will not be assessed (stick figures are okay here)
  • Key props or production details (like background or text additions to the scene)
  • Indicate camera changes as necessary— pan, zoom in/out, focus rack
  • Fading between shots should be indicated if important to the storytelling
  • Notes for music cues, sound effects, and ambient noise, as applicable

Here are some example storyboards:

Lighting yourself (or your subject), so that the viewer can easily see the speaker is a key (no pun intended) step to getting a well-produced finished video! Check out this quick beginner’s guide video from Full Sail University, and then the additional resources below.

Creating great, clear sound is a must for your finished video, and that is why the MPS is set up to capture a high-quality audio track with the use of a Tascam Camera adapter and additional microphones.  You should note–that to get this great sound, that this setup will capture 2 audio tracks–but fear not, they can be easily synched (check out the tutorial below). Check out this cool intro to this piece of equipment that will take your video to the next level:

So, you have your script, your storyboard is ready, you’ve got your lighting just right and the sound is spot on?  Now enter the most basic piece: the camera!  If you are a beginner or are unfamiliar with the Canon EOS 80D, please check out the short intro video below:

Want to dig into some recommended settings? Check out these resources from the field:

We have a variety of backdrops available for use in the MPS as well as a green screen to allow you to add a background post-production. A green screen is a great tool to have a virtually limitless number of options for your background. We have a green screen set up in the recording space at the MPS, and you will note that the lighting positions are designed to make your green screen production as smooth as possible by highlighting the subject and reducing shadow on the green screen itself. This great video walks you through the process of using a greenscreen to customize your background using Adobe Premier which we have in the production space:

Video Management Tools

Uploading Videos to Kaltura My Media

Uploading your videos to Kaltura My Media Space provides you with many benefits including the ability to request professional captions, easy portability between your classes, adding interactive quiz elements, and to track viewer analytics. You should note that the Kaltura video editor is much more basic than Adobe Premiere, and is really more appropriate for trimming the ends, adding bookmarks and making clips. Please contact an instructional designer if you would like to talk about how this step may (or may not) meet your needs.

Storing & Viewing Videos in Google Drive

As UMS faculty, staff, or students, we all have access to the Google Workspace including Google Drive. Saving your video project pieces, such as sound files, video clips and images, in a Google Drive project file is a great way to keep all of your project assets organized.  This also is an easy way to access your project to review, preview, and share pieces through your creative process.  Let’s look at some ways to save multimedia to your maine.edu Google Drive, as well as how to view video from your Drive project folder:

Uploading & Editing Videos in YouTube

Why would you utilize Youtube (or screencast-o-matic, if you have an account) to edit and host videos, when we have Kaltura or the LMS?  Well, perhaps you need your video to have a more public-facing presence, or you are a student (or working with students) who would like a more portable video that is easier to share outside of the University System.  Everyone at the UMS has a Youtube account (as part of the GSuite for Education tools).  Let’s take a quick look at how to upload your saved MP4 video to Youtube, and a peek at the basic editing features available to you if you need this capability:


Multimedia Lending Library

The Media Production studio has a lending library that is available for faculty and students so that you can take a camera outside of the ‘classroom’ and to where the action is!  The lending library contains equipment in kits, which can be mixed or matched, and the checkout process for the kits is through the library–just like books (though there will be a short form to fill out)!  Let’s look at some of the available kits:

  • The Camera kit. This includes a Canon EOS M50 camera–a great all-around camera for capturing still image and film.  This kit also includes a Rode bullet microphone (which mounts on the camera), a lapel mic, batteries on a charger, lens cleaners, and a heavy-duty camera bag.  This kit is available for a 3-Day checkout.
  • The 360-camera kit. This small but mighty kit in an easy-to-tote hard case includes a Ricoh Theta V camera, an ambient sound microphone attachment, and a micro-USB charger/computer connector.  Note that the 360 camera has the ability to capture 25-minutes’ worth of video at a time, but you can upload these files to your laptop or Google Drive and continue filming if you need to: planning is key! This camera also has an easy-to-navigate mobile app. This kit is available for a 3-Day checkout.
  • The Gimbal Crane Kit. The Zihyun gimbal crane stabilizer kit is a precise instrument, which can be used for shots in motion. It includes the crane itself in a hard case (assembly is required–and don’t forget the batteries on the charger!), an optional handlebar accessory with mobile/thumb remote, all in a soft-sided tote.  The crane has a mobile app you will need to install for calibration. Because of the complexity of this instrument, the crane is available for a same-day checkout, so you will have to have it back by the time the library closes (but can re-check it out several days in a row).
  • The tripod. We have a great, highly flexible, and sturdy tripod available for check out, which is perfectly suited for the Canon.  We look forward to the MPS acquiring a monopod for the 360-camera soon!

Adobe Creative Suite

Adobe Premiere Pro

The MPS on campus has a great editing room attached to the recording room!  The computer in that space has Adobe Premier editing software installed-which is a rich editing tool that will allow you to work with film clips, multiple tracks of music and sound effects, manipulate a green screen, and more! 

If you are feeling like you’d like to be a bit more hands-on in your training, Adobe has some great resources:

  • A Short Course for Premier Beginners, with downloadable project files (just note, that in order to work with the project files, you will need to be on a computer with access to Adobe Cloud products)
  • An exhaustive video tutorial page, where you can search for just the training to meet your needs
  • A Premiere Pro User Guide, for text-based tutorials–though this manual is not for the faint of heart

Learning premier can seem overwhelming at first, but if you start with the basics, you can always develop more skills as you need them. Below is a playlist from UMaine’s CTIL to get you up and running:

Editing 360 Video

  1. Start by downloading the Theta Spherical viewer software for your computer from Theta360.com. This is where you will convert the video clips into what’s called an equirectangular video.
  2. Once converted import the clips into your video editor, or Adobe Premiere in the production space. Note–you won’t be able to change the resolution of the video, or crop the image.
  3. After the edit, export the video as an H.264 movie.
  4. Ready to upload? Download the Spatial Media Metadata Injector to add the necessary metadata to your video file. Open the application, select the video you just saved, inject the metadata info, and save it.
  5. Now you’re ready to upload to YouTube and share! 
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